In 2000, running for Congress for the first time as a Hawaiian
resident, with neither a web-site nor an e-mail address of my own, I
was invited by Ko'olau News
to participate in The Level Playing Field. This was an invitation to all
qualified candidates for public office to submit written responses to
their questions on a variety of topics that were then posted on their
site as a public service to their readership on Windward Oahu. The
most memorable and enjoyable of their assignments was to write an
essay illustrating what the participants imagined might result from
their run for office. Editor Shannon Wood stipulated that the
candidate should imagine that he or she was elected to office, and
that a fictional reporter or essayist in the year 2059 was describing
our impact. Letting my imagination run away with me for a while, this
was my response.

It seems that Pops was right about at least one thing. Alan Greenspan
didn't live forever. Fortunately, we managed to return to the
Constitutional Bi-Metallic Standard before the Federal Reserve System
was dissolved and monetary authority returned to the Treasury Department.

As I write this today in response to Kiliana's kind request, it
occurs to me that today is the birthday of that venerable savior of
the American economy. I've taken to flipping a Twenty Dollar gold
piece bearing Greenspan's effigy, a practice that Pops would likewise
endorse, though he would prefer that Calvin Coolidge had remained on
the Twenty and handed a larger piece over to Greenspan's memory.

But popularity wins out on the more commonly circulating coins, and
there's little chance of shaking Reagan loose from the Five Dollar
silver, or Edison from the Deuce, or Ike from the Single, so it's the
Twenty Dollar gold for the last Chairman of the Fed. America will
adjust to Cool Cal's displacement. America has always adjusted.

Maybe I get ahead of myself. Mother had a way of reworking Pops'
advice. Pops would say, "Open your eyes first and your mouth last."
Mother would simply say, "Start at the beginning." Much more elegant
and to the point. Of course, she started out HER political career
very simply, at the age of nine years by saying, "My Dad is running
for Congress. Please vote for him." Ever to the point.

As for me, well, the son of the President doesn't have to do anything
to distinguish himself. Really, he can't, unless he pursues the life
himself. Not for me. Pops lived for the theatre, and found the public
arena to be the grandest stage of all. Mother followed him and Granny
at an earlier age than they started, and soared beyond their wildest
accomplishments.

And as for me? Well, I think I'm starting again. Verbosity has always
been a Duquesne family characteristic. I am the son of our recently
retired President. Many of you voted for her. A few of you hated her,
three people tried to kill her, and, according to the polls, most of
you loved her.

This story is not about her, or me, but about her father, my
grandfather. I call him Pops, she calls him Daddy, and his supporters
know him as Citizen Duquesne. His friends call him Lehr. He was a
member of the Congress at the beginning of this century, and later
our first Libertarian Secretary of State. He would take issue with
that, as he claims that Thomas Jefferson was just about our first
libertarian everything, but he's discussing philosophy, and I'm
talking party label. He wouldn't let the issue go until I clarified
it precisely. My grandfather, Lawrence Knight Duquesne, after serving
as Hawaii's first Libertarian Representative to the United States
Congress, was appointed Secretary of State in America's first
Libertarian Administration. He is an argumentative old cuss now, just
starting his second century, and unavailable for comment, as he is
vacationing in the asteroid belt and almost certainly has his cel-vid
disconnected. Since he is unable to speak for himself just at the
moment, and Kiliana insists that Ko'olau News has strict deadlines,
his legacy is at my mercy.

Pops first ran for the Congress in 1982 at the delicate young age of
26, still wet behind the ears, still fresh from his service in the
United States Air Force, and still an undergraduate at Oregon State
University studying physics and mechanical engineering. In those days
the Libertarian Party did not enjoy the universal ballot status it
does today. In fact, it, and many other "third parties", were quite
ruthlessly excluded by the "Democratic" and "Republican" parties, who
have since joined the Federalists and Whigs in historical oblivion.
Today, with universal suffrage, liberal ballot access requirements,
and proportional representation in most States, the "Bipartisan"
stranglehold on political consciousness is as obsolete as slavery,
witch hunts, and the "War on Drugs."

Anyway, since Libertarians were not on the ballot in Oregon in 1982,
Pops ran a very modest write-in campaign. He got very little
attention from the press (as they tended in those days to focus on
the "horse race" aspects of a contest, rather than the ideas of the
candidates), and fewer votes. The next 14 years are a little fuzzy.
He remained interested in politics and the theatre, I guess, but it
wasn't until 1996 that he ran again. Again from Oregon's 5th
district, and this time the party enjoyed hard won ballot status that
would not be snatched away by incumbent perfidy. His modest showing
in '96 (just under 2%) did nothing but encourage him to press his
case. He was resolved to run again and again every two years,
building his name recognition, widening his network of support,
training himself, refining his approach, and, as he likes to say
endlessly, "banging his drum."

Life intervenes. Mother quotes John Lennon. "Life is what happens to
you while you're busy making other plans."

Pops did not run in '98, as he'd intended after the '96 election. He
even toyed briefly with the notion of entering Oregon's Republican
Primary for the sake of expediency and "respectability." Fortunately
he managed to avoid so base and superficial a scheme. He confessed to
me when I'd asked him about it that he "wanted to win, and if I
couldn't win, I'd like at least to be taken seriously." Stubbornness
won out, thanks in part to circumstances (about which more anon), and
he reconciled himself to Libertarian loyalty and possible "third
party" obscurity. He couldn't have been luckier. It turns out the
"obscurity" was a kinder and gentler fate than Republican oblivion,
but that would take a while.

Circumstances, on the other hand, will ever intervene in our lives.
Due to a combination of factors, professional dissatisfaction,
wanderlust, and Granny's precarious health in those days, in the
summer of 1997, Pops and Granny packed up Mother and the rest of
their lives, and moved to the Big island.

"For the first time in my life," says Pops, "I knew I was home. This
is where I will plunge in my roots." So they settled in to their new
homeland, bought this very house that they later sold to me, and
proceeded to firm up their new network.

"Your Grandfather is very good at taking the credit," says Granny,
"but the truth is I had to push him every step of the way. He
wouldn't have done it without me."

"We couldn't have done it without us," answered Pops. "Moving here or
buying this house, or rebuilding half of it. It was all teamwork."

Sometimes Granny just smiles and lets him have the last word. He does
seem to enjoy it so. They're very good for each other. Still they
squabble endlessly. Two months ago at their 70th wedding anniversary
they were dubbed the Bicker Brats. That one actually shut Pops up for
almost thirty seconds, during which time Granny couldn't stop
laughing.

So anyway, back on track. Because they had the logistical
consideration of the moving and the house and the new jobs and
Granny's health issues, Pops took a pass on the '98 elections. He
excused himself as follows. "I insist that I will always have a
Libertarian to vote for for the rest of my life. I'm done with voting
against. In 1998 Noreen Chun was on the ballot, and I was proud and
pleased to vote for her, and even willing to stand aside if she
wanted to take it on again in Y2K. But I will always vote for a
Libertarian, even if it has to be me."

Since 1996 he has managed to keep that pledge to himself and to
America, always voting for a Libertarian, and through the 2000's,
either voting for his election, or re-election, and later his
successors in the House, after he'd moved on into the Cabinet.

During the first few elections of the century, Libertarians started
slowly trickling into the Congress. Once they finally precluded
either the Republicans or the Democrats from achieving an outright
majority, the Libertarian micro-minority exhibited astonishing
innocence. They were naive enough to expect one party or the other to
approach them to form a coalition majority with libertarian leanings.
But, when the Bipartisan Super-majority coalition was formed it first
looked to be pretty grim, as Libertarians were excluded from any
meaningful committee assignments.

The maneuver, however, soon backfired. The voting public began to
realize that forty years of Democrat control produced dangerous
inflation, hideous wars, and suffocating regulations. Another decade
of Republican control, rather than turning anything around, increased
the budget, increased taxes, and increased regulations. After two
years of undisguised Bipartisan collusion, it became clear to all but
the most dedicated partisans that the "Me-Too Party" and the
"More-of-the-Same Party" were as different as night and evening.

The next election produced a mix of Libertarians and Greens and
Constitutionalists and a few Bipartisan vestiges, but America hasn't
gone back, and as the practice has proven the premise, the
Libertarians continued to gain ground until they finally achieved the
outright majority that they have enjoyed since. The Greens and the
Cons and Democrats and Republicans have since either joined
Libertarian ranks, or collapsed into the Socialist Party, and America
is once again a Two Party system. That seems to be our fate. America
has always adjusted.

And we've had a great deal to adjust to. As the Sovereign State of
Hawaii celebrates its centennial, we fly a flag with (so far)
fifty-four stars. For a few months only it was Alaska, and then for
almost fifty years Hawaii was America's "New Kid on the Block."
Puerto Rico joined the Union in 2008, just a year short of Hawaii's
Golden Jubilee, and just in time to get in on the States of the Union
Commemorative Quarters Celebration.

With two native Spanish speakers in the Senate, and seven new
Hispanic Congressmembers, Anglochauvinist hysteria almost undid us,
but also led us quite naturally to accept Jamaica and Belize when
they petitioned for cession in 2016. And that makes only fifty-three
stars on our flag.

Like Alan Greenspan, it turned out that Fidel Castro also could not
live forever. After his final heart attack, Senor Ortega struggled
for a couple of years to hold it together, but a half century of
Socialist mismanagement had reduced Cuba to the most impoverished
basket case in the hemisphere. After Bay of Pigs II, there was little
resistance to the notion of bringing Cuba home. It still has the
lowest standard of living, the highest infant mortality, the shortest
life expectancy, and the greatest illiteracy of all the States, but
it has come a long way, and Governor Ros assures us that it will soon
close the gap with Mississippi, Alabama, and Puerto Rico.

The notion of Statehood for the District of Columbia was neatly
short-circuited with the passage of the 28th Amendment, which Pops
introduced in his first term in the House. DC gave up its three
Electoral College votes for President, but in return received an
actual voting Representative in the Congress. No Senators, of course,
as they are strictly reserved for the States. Briefly, for those of
you who don't keep track of such things, the 28th Amendment grants
representation in the Congress to all Federal Districts, Territories,
Possessions, and Protectorates in proportion to their actual numbers
just as if they were States, but no representation in the Senate. In
addition, it grants these same entities Presidential Electors equal
in number to their representation in Congress. At present, then, DC
has its own member, Samoa has one, the Lunar Settlement has one, and
Guam and Saipan and the rest of the Marianas have two altogether.

Back home in these Islands, the pace has been a little slower, but
changes have been inexorable.

The Sovereigntist/Secession movement reached its crescendo at about
the same time that Libertarians achieved their first working majority
coalition with the Republicans and the Constitutionalists. As federal
assets were being divested to resolve the debt and retire Social
Security, Pops included the "Millenial Mahele" rider. Those federal
lands not essential to national security, nor having unique
historical significance, were returned to all the peoples of the
Islands on the basis of ancestry, nativity, and longevity. The
ancestry component was his only public racist act and he refuses
still to apologize for it.

"We are all Hawaiians, whether we were born here or not," he said
when he introduced the amendment, "whether our ancestors arrived here
from the Marquesas or Tahiti, from India or Indonesia or Indiana. We
all deserve a piece of the pie, but some of us are going to get
bigger pieces. Crimes were committed against the Hawaiian people and
the Hawaiian nation, but the criminals are all dead and the victims
are all dead. We are left to pick up the pieces. This is my
compromise. For every year you lived here you get credit. For being
born here you get credit. For tracing your grandparents in these
islands to the eighteenth century, you get additional credit. How
much remains to be seen. The catch is, you stop your whining and get
on with your lives. Now let's hammer out the details." And of course,
Hawaii has adjusted to all the extra private property. There are a
few competing nativist enclaves, and by and large the Hawaiian
language and culture continue to flourish. It is, after all, an
integral part of our unique heritage. Unfortunately, the whining
hasn't stopped, but at leat the volume has been turned down.

When the Democrat/Green/Socialist dominated Senate attempted to push
through the Inter-Island Highway System, and the Lib/Rep/Con
controlled House killed the measure, Pops nearly lost his job. But
with the economy newly stimulated by the substantial tax cuts and
regulatory relief, with the population increasing on the neighbor
islands while Oahu's flattened out, some investors took the notion
and ran with it.

Inside of two years a system of tunnels had linked Oahu and Molokai
and Maui and Lanai. Later, after Kahoolawe was finally cleaned of
live ordnance by violent criminals (with surprisingly few
casualties), it and the Big Island were connected to the traffic
grid. Of course the airline lobby shrieked and howled that the
tunnels were a threat to public safety. And it is a matter of
knee-jerk reflex among the Socialists and the last remaining Greens
that the State Government should seize the tunnels from the predatory
Road Company and operate them for the benefit of all Hawaiians,
rather than let them enrich a few greedy investors. Most people,
however, rather enjoy driving from island to island and don't mind
tossing a few silver coins into a wire basket. We remember what air
travel used to cost, both in money and in time. It's faster to drive.

Besides, even among the tunnels there is competition, if you don't
mind driving the long way around sometimes. After NASA built the
magnetic induction track from Puolo Point to the peak of Mauna Kea to
launch cargo canisters into orbit, it leased space on the structure
to other investors so there is now an express route from Kauai to
Hawaii with links to the southern coasts of all the islands it passes.

I'm going to have to wrap this up so I can get back to work, but
before I depart I'll leave you with this last bit. Since Mother left
office there has been talk of Pops returning to the public arena and
making another run at the White House. Twelve years as Vice President
under two separate Presidents apparently hasn't cured him of the
notion, so he refuses to rule it out. I think he's actually taking
the idea seriously.

America will have to adjust.

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